Mehring, you gotta picket the whole Axis line, man, and make them think twice about those narrow penetrations. ZOC the whole thing, one unit every 3 hexes, keep in contact with the enemy at all times. Yes it's expensive and you'll lose the units more often than not, but there it is. If they ignore your picket line you can cause them a ton of headaches.

I don't see it in 1.06 Flavius. Sure, a picket would have slowed the southward drive a bit, a division or two actually did, but that 40+ MP division he's saved for the final drive will usually get through, just like the turn before, it got through my main line and countless pickets in front of Kharkov, as well as the garrison, to take the city. That's always been the case, and it's good play. But I'm highlighting a shift in play balance which makes the Russians phenomenally weak in 1941 in stead of making them stronger, which when playing German, I thought they needed.

The Russians can barely move and attack and they can barely move through enemy controlled ground, let alone through ZOC. You need 5 or 6 Russian divisions to hit one German regiment, and that's starting to look like an army, not a picket. So unless the Axis railnet is within a hex or two of the front, what headaches can the Russians cause these days? A smart Axis player will ignore a Russian picket and be thankful for the handfull less divisions between him and the Russian industry.

I agree that the fighting power but not the MP of at least the beginning Russian units should be higher. Maybe keep the NM and morale the same (movement is tied to morale I thing) but increase the Experience? That should make them tougher but fragile.

Well...it allows your infantry to move twice as fast. The reason being they 'know' they will not be shot at.

It is not material that the terrain is 'empty' of enemy units. As an attacker, you just dont know. And in not knowing, you will be careful..otherwise you will lost a lot of men to minefields, ambushes and other nasty defender suprises.

But because we have god like powers of observation in a game, you say 'hey! he has no enemy units there, why shouldnt I just run through at full speed?'

While I accept that the current method is an abstraction, that does have some control from the defender (ie picket lines) the whole idea of 'control' of an empty hex does seem rather silly.....unless it was taken in context of a front line.

I would have to say that the rule, as it stands is probably the best compromise, but perhaps control of hexes shouldnt flip at the beginning of your turn, but at the end?

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What's the sense of sending $2 million missiles to hit a $10 tent that's empty?

A compromise between what? You outline perfectly, the reason for not flipping hexes but I can't see any argument in its favour, but here is one for changing their status at least.

Rumours of enemy units in your rear might well cause extra caution in moving behind your lines, caution mitigated where absence of enemy units might be verified, as much by civilian authorities as military. But that is no argument for giving 'own control' movement rates for enemy units. Perhaps a solution, pending hex conversion in the normal way, would be a new 'uncontrolled' hex status, with a MP premium for both sides, nominally higher for the encircler/raider but modified as usual by experience and morale etc.

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“The end of democracy and the defeat of the American Revolution will occur when government falls into the hands of lending institutions and moneyed incorporations.” ¯ Thomas Jefferson